New Perspectives on Paul

People have been struggling with the writings of the Apostle Paul from the time he first walked on this earth and began proclaiming the gospel all over the eastern part of the world. However, over the past 50 years the debate has intensified as leading scholars have come to different interpretations of Paul’s literature. This has led to a reexamination of Paul’s writings and the articulation of a strong defense of one’s beliefs about the historical Paul. This paper is being written in order to articulate some of the newer positions pertaining to Pauline Research and to provide some possible implications from their outcomes. The new perspectives on Paul can be rather confusing for the general layperson, so it is the goal of this paper to clarify and explain these new positions in contrast to the prevalent and classically held orthodox view that contains many doctrines that the church has stood upon for years.

The term, “New Perspective on Paul,” was a coined phrase used in 1982 by James Dunn that named the ongoing Pauline Research being done. However, this research and movement started much before Dunn’s time (Johnson, 62). The beginnings can be traced to Krister Stendahl, a Luthern theologian, who began arguing that Augustine and Luther were reading their current troubles into Paul’s writings. This would mean that their concerns were not the same as Paul’s historical concerns (Westerholm, 134). Obviously this has led to accusations of misinterpretation within the historical Text. The scholars doing this research claim that they are returning to a more historical and Jewish Paul. In his book, Paul: In Fresh Perspective, the renowned scholar N.T.Wright, a proponent of the new perspective explains:

It is one thing to loca...

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...ve, and I look forward to following along and maybe someday being a part of it as well.

Works Cited

Calvin, Jean, A. N. S. Lane, and Hilary Osborne. The Institutes of Christian Religion. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1987. Print.

Dunn, James. The New Perspective on Paul. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans Pub, 2008. Print.

Esv Study Bible. Harpercollins Pub Ltd, 2008. Print.

MacArthur, John, Nathan Busenitz, Scott Lang, and Phillip R. Johnson. Fool's Gold?: Discerning Truth in an Age of Error. Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2005. Print.

Piper, John. The Future of Justification: a Response to N.T. Wright. Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2007. Print.

Westerholm, Stephen. Perspectives Old and New on Paul: the "Lutheran" Paul and His Critics. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2004. Print.

Wright, N. T. Paul: in Fresh Perspective. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005. Print.